


Scary Little Thing Called Love

by Writings_of_a_Hufflepuff



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Fred ends up awkwardly admitting how much he cares about her, Fred is pissed, George is just happy for his bro, Hurt/Comfort, Love Confessions, body shaming and wizarding racial slurs, hermione doesn't care what some slytherin has to say, plus size hermione, set hermione's 5th year
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:47:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27180629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Writings_of_a_Hufflepuff/pseuds/Writings_of_a_Hufflepuff
Summary: Fred and Hermione find themselves confronting feelings after a Slytherin in the halls is rude to Hermione. Fred isn’t happy, and finds himself ready to throw a few punches, but Hermione stops him, leading to a conversation that reveals a few truths.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Fred Weasley
Comments: 8
Kudos: 118





	Scary Little Thing Called Love

**Author's Note:**

> Hermione is plus size because I headcanon her as fat and you can pry it from my cold dead fingers.

“Oi, Mudblood! Yeah, you! Filthy, fat mudblood!” Even though it’s a shout Hermione barely hears it, the truth is she is used to the comments, the sneers, the blood purist bullshit. She is used to the comments that she has dirty blood, that she doesn’t belong, that she is tainted. She is used to the comments that she is fat, that the softness of her thighs, the width of her hips and the bulge of her stomach somehow make her an Other even more. In her 5th year at Hogwarts, her 5th year of the amazing magical world to which she belonged, she had long since gotten used to the comments and often barely heard them. They still hurt but she had learnt that talking back did little good, she couldn’t use her logic to change the minds of bigots and bullies, they simply wouldn’t listen and she wasn’t inclined to get into fights, not with the same quickness that both Harry and Ron seemed to. 

So you see it wasn’t the shout or the insulting words that made her stop in her tracks and turn back around, hand grabbing at the strap of her satchel, heavy with books, but rather a different voice, one she knew a little too well and was slightly deeper than it’s partner. Because this voice always came in a pair. 

“Why don’t you put a sock in it, Morley, or maybe I should do it for you?” She knows his voice far too well for her liking. At first her ability to tell Fred from George without even seeing a glimpse was something she prided herself on, another puzzle solved, another mystery checked off...and then she realised what it meant. That she had truly paid such attention to Fred that she knew it was Fred because in truth it wasn’t which is Fred and which is George, it was which was Fred. Her ability to tell the twins apart was solely based on her knowledge of Fred. Of his voice, his mannerisms, the placement of his moles and freckles, the way he held himself and wore his uniform. George wasn’t really George, he wasn’t Fred...it scared her a little, that at some point Fred had become  _ Fred  _ and not Fred and George, not just one of the twins.    
  


He’s messily dressed as always, a million dress code violations coming straight to her mind from the way his tie is barely tied to the untucked white shirt that has at least 2 or 3 different burn marks on it. His hair is wild as always, shoulders the usual broad width, freckles stark and many against his skin, but his expression is one she isn’t particularly used to and has never been fond of. 

“I’d like to see you try Weasley, you can probably barely get your wand to work. Another hand-me-down? Besides, it’s not like I'm lying. Granger  _ is _ a fat, filthy mudblood.” With each word the Slytherin, one she doesn’t even know, turns to her and smirks. It should make her angry, but it just makes her scoff. She has little energy for it any more, but it strikes her that Fred doesn’t appear to feel the same as her on the matter.

He looks terrifyingly angry, for someone who is often seen with a smile or a smirk on his lips, often heard with a laugh in his voice, and smile in his eyes, the glare sent towards the Slytherin is...unusual and Hermione thinks, rather unwelcome. 

She bridges the gap between the two of them, hands wrapping around Fred’s forearm, noticing how he’s clenching his fists tight enough that his knuckles are stark white. “It’s not worth it, Fred. Come on.” She gestures away with a tilt of her head and pulls at his arm, lightly, not enough to move him, but enough to make it clear she doesn’t want him to start a fight on her behalf. She doubted she’d be able to move him if he didn’t want to be moved, years of playing beater on the quidditch team had made Fred quite strong. 

His brown eyes meet her own for a few seconds as Fred contemplates whether he should listen or whether throwing the first punch or hex would be more satisfying. Hermione isn’t sure what sways him in the end, what makes him listen, but he begins to walk with her away from Morley even as he throws out insulting comments about Fred and her. She expects Fred to turn back around when Morley calls her a mudblood bitch, but he just clenches his jaw and walks a little faster, his pace has her almost running to keep up with his taller form. 

He walks her to a little alcove in the Transfiguration corridor, out of the way of any passing Slytherins who might have a few nasty words to say. His jaw is still clenched, shoulders tense the way she’s only really seen when he’s on the quidditch pitch before a swing of the beaters bat, there’s a redness in his cheeks but the sort that comes from anger rather than anything pleasant.

“Are...are you alright Fred?” Hermione realises that her hand is still on his forearm and goes to pull away but he reaches his hand forward to grasp hers. It...is unusual. Fred and her had never been the sort of friends, because years of knowing him surely meant they were friends, who held hands or hugged. There had always been a distance there, the occasional ruffle of her hair as he walked past to annoy her, or a hand on her back as he moved past. Nothing more, nothing less. 

She didn’t find it terribly unpleasant though. It was quite nice really, his hand was larger than hers, covered in freckles and scars.

“They shouldn’t talk to you like that.” He says it quietly, so entirely un-Fred like that she finds herself concerned. He is always loud, in fact Fred is often louder and bolshier than George. He rarely spoke gently or quietly, unless he felt he needed to for someone else’s benefit. She’d seen it a few times, particularly this year, often when he and George found a first year crying in the corridors after some sort of rough treatment from Umbridge. 

“It’s okay...I don’t really listen anymore.” She tightens her grip on his hand, combating the urge to twist and lock her fingers through his own. This is unusual as it is and she knows that if Ron or Harry found them they’d stand there bug eyed, jaws on the floor, mouths gaping open. Hermione and Fred didn’t hold hands, to most it seemed like they barely tolerated each other. She actually liked him...when he wasn’t testing on first years and trying her patience. She could admit that he was brilliant at magic, she could admit that his little smirks and smiles made her chest ache. She could admit that if they weren’t so diametrically opposed when it came to rules and education they might very well be the best of friends. 

“It’s not okay, Mione. It’s really not…” Fred pulls his hand out of hers and rubs his eyes with a sigh, she misses the feel of his hand in hers...it’s a disconcerting realisation. 

“Why does it bother you so much?” Tightening her grip on the strap of the satchel over her shoulder, Hermione isn’t sure if she wants to know. Will it hurt? Will it heal? Will his words reach that part of her that she’s been trying to ignore? Will that be smothered or awoken with renewed vigour? There’s an apprehension in her, a wait for his words, what might he say next. 

“Because...because I…” She’s never seen him struggle with words, Fred is a man of many words. He could talk the hind legs off of a donkey. With his wit, overly confident personality and Gryffindor bravery, he was rarely at a loss for words. 

“Fred?” There’s redness filling his cheeks, his neck, the tops of his ears. She is used to seeing it on Ron, whenever he’s angry or embarrassed or feeling something particularly strong. She’s seen it on Ginny as well, it appears to be quite the Weasley trait, but she’s unsure why it’s happening to Fred right now. 

“I care about you. That’s all.” What he really wants to say is that he thinks he might be in love with her; that she’s beautiful, passionate, intelligent, wonderful, even when she’s yelling at him. Especially when she’s yelling at him. That he thinks she should be treated like the brilliant witch that she is. That her parentage shouldn’t matter, that she’s brilliant because she’s muggleborn, that he lies awake some nights staring at the wood above his bed thinking about her, about how he wished he was braver. How he wished he could just be a Gryffindor and tell her. But, he can’t because of Ron, he tells himself, because Ron would be hurt and he couldn’t do that to him. In truth, Fred thinks it’s more because he’s terrified that she’d laugh in his face. She’s a prefect, brightest witch of her age, on track to being Head Girl. She’s beautiful, all soft curves and wild hair. He’s likely to drop out of school any minute, a joker, a prankster, not worth much if you asked most people. Trouble. She’s above him, out of his league in so many ways and he doubts she’d ever feel the way he does. 

“You’re my little brother’s best friend. I have to look out for you.”

“Well, if it’s such a chore then don’t bother!” She can feel her hackles rising, in a way only Weasley’s ever seem to manage. She refuses to be someone’s chore, to be cared for simply because someone feels obliged. She takes a step back from him, arms crossing over her chest and turning her back to him so that she can leave his presence. If she’s such a chore then she won’t stick around to bother him any.

“Wait! Merlin’s balls! Hermione!” She’s rather spritely despite her height when she wants to be and he’s chasing after her down the hall, pushing his long legs as fast as he can to catch her because he didn’t mean it like that. She’s not a chore. She’ll never be a chore. Even when she’s being frustratingly idealistic or overly rule abiding, she was never a chore for him. 

“I like you! Okay? I like you and I don’t like people being bloody shitty to you, okay?!” It does what he expects, stops her in her tracks. Feet stopping, skirt falling delicately around her knees, hair the only thing moving due to the slight breeze from open archways near the transfiguration courtyard.

He can feel the heat in his face, his whole body. He can feel the stares of random students who knew them by name and face only, eager to find some new gossip to spread around Hogwarts. By dinner time everyone would know that Fred Weasley had a crush on little miss prefect Hermione Granger. It bothered him, but not in the way he expected it to. He didn’t care that people knew that he liked her, he cared that people would judge her for it. That she’d be teased and picked on more than she already was. All because of him. If George had been there none of this would have happened, he only ever seemed to put his foot in his mouth with Hermione when he was on his own, unsupervised. 

She was silent, still and he found himself unable to stand the silence filling in the void, making things worse, no doubt. “I think you’re amazing...you’re smart, you have your beliefs, convictions and stick to them, you don’t let yourself be cowed. You’re bloody beautiful, even when you’re angry, especially when you’re angry. I wish i’d been there when you punched Malfoy, bet you were a sight…” He barely gives himself time to breathe, she’s still not turned to look at him and he can feel the stares on his back, there’s one particular Hufflepuff who looks overjoyed to be witnessing him make a fool of himself, “Look, I know you probably hate me, and Ron is...well, I know he’s your first choice and...and it’s okay, and I am putting my foot in it and it’s stupid and I should really shut up…” 

She lets him ramble not because she wants to but because she’s not sure she can actually unglue her feet from the floor, it seems totally outlandish that this is happening to her. That  _ she _ , Hermione Granger, resident SWOT, is the one being confessed to right now and by Fred of all people. He’s...he’s better than her in so many ways. Sure, she’s smart and talented, but...he’s popular, funny, incredibly inventive with his magic, ambitious, and handsome…She’d rarely admit it, only when pressed by a few girls she trusted most, but Fred was incredibly handsome and she felt like she fell short in comparison. He should be going after someone tall and leggy, someone with perfect hair and impeccable taste in clothes, maybe someone part Veela. She thought back to girls like Angelina, like Fleur, how they seemed to fit right for him, how they were the opposite of her. 

But he wasn’t. He was behind her, rambling away. Saying all the things she’d always wanted to hear from someone. She knew she was difficult sometimes. She was a staunch abider of rules when possible, and when no threat to life was occuring. She was hot headed and stubborn, logical to a fault, sometimes to the detriment of her friendships. She knew she had walls up high around her, because it so often seemed that everything was a joke, that people made her a joke...this became especially noticeable in 3rd year when people started asking her out on Hogsmeade dates as a joke...it made her realise how little people thought of her. She was too swotty, too good, too logical or too stubborn, too big, too plump, too hard around the edges, too smart, or too right. She’d learnt to stop worrying about others but the wall had gone up. The wall that she could feel crumbling away as he rants nervous like she might turn around and laugh in his face. 

“But, I can’t have you hate me, ‘Mione. I...it’s fine if you’re not interested and I’d get it. I mean you’re...you’re too good for me and way out of my league, but please don’t hate me. I couldn’t stand that, I can take you laughing in my face though, if you want? I mean...i’d rather you laugh in my face then never talk t-” 

She’s never been one for running, sports, always hated P.E at primary school and certainly wasn’t a fan of Quidditch now she was at Hogwarts, but she could still move pretty fast when she wanted to. So fast in fact that her body was acting before her mind had fully caught up with what it was planning on doing. 

Fred is cut off by a soft body colliding with his, a mass of brown curls tickling his nose, his arms awkwardly held at his side as his mind takes some time to catch up with what’s happening. 

Hermione presses her cheek into his chest, arms wrapping as tight as they can around him. He smells like freshly mown grass, gunpowder, and something she can only and has only ever been able to describe as Weasley, like the Burrow on a cold winter’s night when the fire is roaring and Mrs Weasley has Celestine Warbeck caterwauling through the wireless. He feels like home, like safety and it’s a startling realisation that has tears welling in her eyes because Fred had always had her back, he always came back and smiled with a joke on his lips, no matter how many times she threatened him or told him off, no matter what. Whenever Harry and Ron weren’t talking to her for whatever bizarre reason he always made an effort to spend time with her, even if she rejected his efforts. He had always been there and had always in everything he’d done, shown that he cared...and she’d been oblivious or willfully in denial. She had spent so long adamant that the two of them were opposites in the worst sort of way that she’d never fully understood why she paid close attention to him or why she struggled not to smile around him.

“‘Mione?” Some of the sense comes back to him and he has enough to wrap his arms around her and enjoy this while it lasts. To enjoy the softness of her waist and the warmth of her pressed against him, the comfort he feels from her holding him tight. He knows it won’t last, but he’s determined to enjoy it while it does, leaning down to press his cheek against the crown of her head, despite the ticklish curls that attack him. She smells like Jasmine, old books from the restricted section, and something else that he’s not able to identify. 

“I’m not out of your league…” It’s mumbled into the grey wool of his school vest, so low he almost doesn’t hear it, but he’s so fixated on her that everything seems heightened. Every word seems louder, every twitch of her fingers on his back seems like a greater movement. 

He doesn’t know what to say, so he waits, holds her closer, tighter. “If anything you’re out of my league,” He’s about to protest because there is absolutely no way that he’s more deserving of her than she is of him, but she continues and doesn’t give him time to interject, “but I like you anyway...and...and i’m really glad that you like me too.” It’s shy, unnaturally so for Hermione, but he finds it sweet, the soft voice, the refusal to look up and instead keep her face pressed against his chest. 

It feels like his heart might actually burst from happiness, he’s prone to over exaggeration he is a Weasley twin after all, but...he’s never felt this sort of happy ache in his chest before, he’s been happy, he’s been excited, proud, a whole host of wonderful emotions...but this is different.

He pulls back from here, hands at her shoulders to push her away gently, just far enough so that he can actually look her in her eyes, cast his gaze across soft, round cheeks covered in red and a lip bitten between teeth. 

“Does that mean you’ll go to Hogsmeade with me this weekend?” He asks this instead of something bigger because he knows Hermione, knows she’d run if he went too quickly, and asked her to be his girlfriend too soon. He knows her well enough to know that a date is intimidating but it’s something she can handle, a bite sized chunk of something new, rather than a massive banquet. 

Hermione’s hands pressed into his shoulders as she bit her lip, eyelashes fluttering against her cheeks as she looked down for a moment before meeting his eye with a wide smile stretching across her lips. 

“Yes, Fred...I’ll go with you to Hogsmeade.” There’s a brief pause where he knows he’s grinning like a mad man, but neither say a thing. It’s strange, navigating the waters between friendship and something else. He knows how he feels and he supposes he knows how she feels, but getting there, to that stage where this is normal and not some sort of strange fever dream is going to take time. 

The pause is broken by Hermione reaching up on her tiptoes, using the hand on his shoulder for balance as she places a delicate kiss to his cheek. He knows he’s bright red, can feel the heat burning in his face worse than the first trial run of fever fudge. But, he doesn’t care, wouldn’t care even if all his brothers and Ginny were stood nearby watching, pointing and laughing. He knows he’s smiling like an absolutely idiot, that that annoying hufflepuff is probably laughing into their hand about Fred Weasley and his stupid grin all over a little kiss on the cheek.

She’s red too, biting her lip to hide a smile as she takes a step back from him, and another, and another before turning on her heel with a shy goodbye and sweet wave. He watches her go with a silly smile and even after she’s turned a corner and he can’t see her anymore he’s still smiling. 

“Oi, Gred! What’re you smiling about?” He’s so caught up in the thought of Hermione that he almost physically jumps in the air when George ‘sneaks’ up on him. 

“Well, O’darling twin of mine, I have a date!” He grins wide, arms outstretched in a showman sort of fashion, knowing his twin will share in his enthusiasm. 

“Wait…” The wheels are turning in George’s head, he knows Fred has a little itty not so bitty crush on their resident bookworm, he also knows he’s been decidedly un-Gryffindor like in his attitude towards her and his feelings. It took him hours to just get Fred to admit that liking her wasn’t some sort of betrayal of ickle Ronnie-Kins. As much as George loved his little brother, he wasn’t about to let his twin back out of his feelings because his little brother couldn’t get his head out of his arse long enough to realise Hermione was right in front of him and yes, Ron, a girl.

“With who?” His twin has been, admittedly, cowardly about Hermione, and he doesn’t doubt for a second that he might have got the bright idea to ask some other girl out just to put his uncomfortably fond feelings to rest, as if that would even work. So he asks, because he knows his twin well enough to know he’s not above making stupid choices and decisions. 

“...Granger.” It’s uncharacteristically quiet, but George is used to that whenever Fred mentions Hermione and his feelings. His twin is unusually bashful and unsure about it all, but he can see the shine behind his eyes and the power behind his smile, he knows if it all goes well, to plan, that quiet will go and Fred will be as loud as he always is. But, for now, he smiles at his twin and claps him on the shoulder, making a terrible joke about their resident bookworm, because he’s happy for him...even if he worries he might not get as much of his time as before. 

All George ever wants is for his twin to be happy.


End file.
